


a long way from home

by hiuythn



Series: klanceweek 2018 [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Galra Keith (Voltron), Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-21 01:10:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13729935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hiuythn/pseuds/hiuythn
Summary: Keith whips around, a snarl on his face and a scathing retort ready on his lips. And then he realizes what he’s looking at. His jaw drops.“You’rehuman.”





	a long way from home

**Author's Note:**

> for klanceweek 2018, day 1 prompt: earth

_“Kra dival zesaar bulirma, Chukar,”_ says a dry, derisive voice.

Keith whips around, a snarl on his face and a scathing retort ready on his lips.

He’s so damn sick and tired of the muttering and the glares, the simultaneous avoidance and harassment he’s gotten since he was pushed into this cell. It’s gone from “accidental” jostling, to outright slamming him into the walls. The other prisoners spit at his feet, trample on his food tray when it arrives, and hurl insults in foreign tongues at him.

They stopped after he took advantage of his…new form, to bare his teeth at them and _hiss._ He half-startled himself, too; it wasn’t exactly a voluntary reaction. But it _did_ get them to back off, so he pushed away the revulsion he felt about what he now was.

But those words—that’s the breaking point. He doesn’t know the language but the mocking tone is _more_ than obvious. Maybe he should give them more reason to leave him the fuck alone, and he falls into a fighting stance, fists clenched.

And then he realizes what he’s looking at. His jaw drops. “You’re _human.”_

It shouldn’t make his shoulders slump with staggering relief to see human ears and a human nose, brown eyebrows and brown hair and brown skin, but _god_ , it does. This guy—though he spoke in that weird grating tongue of the stupid purple cat-people, though he’s viciously scarred to the point where he blends in with the hostiles around them—he is so undeniably _human_.

And he’s staring back at Keith, just as dumbfounded. The taunting mask on his face melts away into shock, his eyes wide and the sclera oddly bright in the darkened cell.

“You…know English?” he asks. Gone is the confrontational stance, hands falling from his hips to hang limply by his sides. “Why— _how_ do you know _English_?”

“I’m hum—” Keith swallows— “from Earth, I’m from Earth, too. Texas.”

“Tex—” the guy makes a gurgling noise. “You’re from _Texas?_ Buddy, you do _not_ look Texan. You barely look _human_.”

Keith scowls. “This is a recent development. I didn’t know I was half-alien.”

“What do you mean, you ‘didn’t know?’” There’s a hysterical note to the guy’s words, and his face is doing this weird twisting thing, like he doesn’t know if he should laugh or cry. “You just wake up one day with purple fur with ears, dude?”

“No,” says Keith, “I woke up one day, a week into my Pluto mission, to find that my team had been abducted by overgrown cats. And when I tried to blow off their heads, one of them did some _avada kedavra_ shit and instead of dying, I manifested into a cryptid.”

“Dude,” says the guy.

“I know,” says Keith.

“No, dude, this is going to _suck balls_ for you,” says the other boy. He jerks back, suddenly, and casts his gaze around the cell, as if just remembering where they are.

“It already kind of sucks balls.” Keith drags a hand down his face. His nails are _wrong—_ too long.

“Oh man, you have no idea,” the guy breathes. He keeps eyeing the other prisoners, and something like dread creeps into his eyes. “Anyone can tell that you've got Galra blood, and nobody likes anything related to the Galra. And you’re in _here,_ with _us._ You’re a _prisoner._ ”

“And?”

The guy pins him with a look, and Keith is taken aback by the pity and the worry in it. “The Galra putting you in here means they don’t care if you live or die, they don’t think you’re one of them. But to these guys?” He jerks his head slightly to the aliens skirting at the edges. “You’re plenty Galra. Enough to hate, and enough to fuck with. Before you, there were two other half-Galra. ‘Were’ being the keyword, here.”

“Oh,” says Keith. The glowing eyes he sees in the shadows on the other side of cell seem much more menacing now. A thought slips into his head, then, when the guy shifts on his feet and ends up just a little closer than he was before. “Well then, what the hell are you standing around me for?”

“What?”

Keith takes a step away. “It can’t be good for you to be near me, right? They’re going to think you’re with me; you could end up hurt.”

It feels incredibly wrong, backing away from the only sense of familiarity that he’s found out here, but one glance around tells him there are so many species stronger than a human, and he’d rather this guy not be caught between Keith and some of those nasty-looking claws.

He looks over again, and blinks.

The guy’s turned away, arms folded and head hunkered down between his trembling shoulders. He’s wheezing.

Keith almost panics because maybe he’s having a sudden allergic reaction or something, but then the boy turns around and wipes a finger under his eye, a grin stretched wide over his face.

“You’re worried about _me_. I’m a complete stranger and you’re _worried_ ,” he says breathlessly, like he’s astonished. “Man, I almost forgot what that feels like.”

Keith feels warmth creep up his neck. “That’s not— _I am not worried_.”

“Aw, buddy, don’t be shy.” An arm is thrown around Keith’s shoulders, and he jolts from the sudden influx of _touch_ and _warmth_ and the musty scent of another person pressed up against him. He leans as far back as he can.

Smiley-boy just tightens his hold and says, “But you don’t need to be concerned about me, I’ve lasted this long, haven’t I?”

“Maybe you’re just stupid lucky,” Keith says, still trying to wiggle his way out.

“You know,” Smiley-boy says, “I think we’re gonna get along just fine.”

“They are literally all staring at us,” Keith hisses. It’s hard to ignore the odd, new growl under his words, or the way several prisoners either flinch back or glare harder at the sound. “Are you sure you wanna keep messing around like this?”

“I don’t know, I think it’ll be fun to have someone to bother. It’s been kinda boring recently.”

Keith sighs, giving up on his attempts to escape. “Boring. Being imprisoned, stuck in an alien trafficking ring and you say ‘boring.’ You think dying is going to be any more fun?”

Smiley-boy rolls his eyes. “Wow, pessimistic much? Dude, I told you to chill, I can take care of myself. It’s you I’m worried about.”

“So you’re going to, what—look after me?” Keith raises his brows. “Contrary to my appearance, I’m not a housecat.”

“Hm,” says the guy, “I don’t know, you _are_ the smallest Galra I’ve ever seen.”

Keith narrows his eyes. “Listen, you—”

“Lance.”

“What?”

“My name,” says the boy, “is Lance.”

A heartbeat, where Keith digests that. Lance—a fairly normal name, strikingly innocuous in a place like this.

He should decline the unspoken offer, he really should. It's clear that this guy has less common sense than his situation would dictate, and at the very least, Keith feels obligated not to make him a bigger target. It could be easy, Keith thinks, to sweep his legs out from under him, pin him the ground and growl in his face, drive in the point that Keith isn't human anymore—isn't safe to be around. It should be easy.

A moment ago, he wouldn't have hesitated to do that. But already, things have changed, all because he now has a name for this stranger. He doesn't know the guy well enough to say he meant for that to happen but—well. He feels a smile tug at his lips. It seems like he’s stuck with _Lance_ for the foreseeable future.

Okay, then. He can think of worse people to rely on.

“Keith,” he replies, and watches Lance’s lips when he mouths it back. He pauses. “Also, how long are you going to hold onto me for; you stink.”

“Like you’re any better!”

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading, comments and kudos are super appreciated <3
> 
> also, like no one's asking but i'm a fckn linguistics nerd and those words that lance says at the beginning have meaning, which is basically "you're a long way from home, half-breed." yeah it's mean, lance was mean, he thought keith was galra lol
> 
> [my tumblr, send me a message!!!](http://hiuythn.tumblr.com/)


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